HELP!! (I need a good street bike)

[euphonius]

Dear Rangu66,

Tell us a bit about Nicholasville, Kentucky. From Google Earth I can see you are surrounded by countryside and there are enticing mountains and forests to your east and southeast. There's a lot of things a Chinese 250 can do and do well. One is navigate twisty roads, paved and otherwise, in rural and mountainous areas. One thing they don't do well is go fast. Trying to squeeze 80mph out of a Chinabike is a recipe for disappointment, and probably trouble.

OK, at risk of sounding to your young ears like an old fart, let me say that the true joy of a Chinabike, and maybe of any motorbike, is piloting yourself independently through amazing places that may or may not be difficult for other vehicles to get to -- up narrow canyons and along rivers, through forests and deserts, up and down rocky, broken, twisted paths to meadows and hilltops that few others see. The only time I really think about speed is when calculating how long it will take to get to the "good riding"; the speed in itself is at best a cheap thrill.

If you want the cheap thrill of speed, you're going to need to save your bucks for a few more months and go for a proper Japanese crotch rocket. Cheap chinabikes are no shortcut for getting there. At your age, the odds of you killing yourself, and perhaps others, on a sport bike are quite high, which is unfortunate. But even worse is that you might actually miss out on the deeper joys of motorcycling, which have as much to with going slow with great skill and great awe for your surroundings as with horsepower and speed.

Do you have the skills and vision and heart to be a great motorcyclist?

Whatever you do, ride safely!